This invention relates to an electronic lock that mounts on the front door of a refrigerator to limit access to the refrigerator. The invention is more specifically directed to a refrigerator door lock that connects to a remote computer system, e.g., in a hospital or health care facility, to secure pharmaceuticals that need to be refrigerated, and to facilitate keeping an audit trail of access to the refrigerator. The invention may also be employed as an adjunct to a weight loss program. The lock may also be used in connection with a warming cabinet for ingestible materials or injectable materials such as contrast agents for radiography, where the materials need to be kept at body temperature.
In general, pharmaceuticals are delivered to patients when needed, and those that need to be kept refrigerated are stored in a refrigerator in the pharmacy of the hospital or other facility. However, it is more convenient and better use of the nurse's time and efforts to keep the pharmaceuticals at the patient locations, i.e., in the patient's room or ward, or in the cluster of rooms where the patient is located. However, those drugs that need refrigeration cannot simply be stored in a secured dispensing cabinet at the room or nurse station, but have to be kept in a refrigerator until needed. The refrigerator is either unsecured, or is kept locked with a key lock, with the key distribution limited only to certain persons in the nursing staff and pharmacy staff. Any record of access to the refrigerator would have to be maintained on a paper record, or by separately keying in information on separate computer work station. There is also no means provided to ensure that the refrigerator is kept locked, to alarm if the refrigerator is left open or unlocked, or to monitor the refrigerator's operating temperature. In the current systems, there is no means provided to warn the pharmacy department or the nursing staff if the refrigeration cabinet has failed to maintain the materials at the chilled temperature, or if the refrigeration or other storage cabinet has failed to maintain the proper relative humidity.
It would be desirable to employ a refrigerator as a pharmacy cabinet at the patient location in which medications that have been prescribed for a patient can be loaded by pharmacy staff and stored securely until administered to the patient, which will automatically keep track of access to the refrigerated cabinet, and which can be accessed by the nurse staff electronically (e.g., using wireless means). It is also desirable to ensure that the refrigerated cabinet is kept secure, and that the operating temperature is sufficiently cool. However, no measure exists, up to the present, to carry this out.
In addition to temperature monitoring, some pharmaceuticals need to be monitored for humidity, and some for both temperature and some for both temperature and humidity when stored.
Also, some medicaments and medical products need to be stored at a temperature above ambient. For example, radiographic contrast materials need to be stored at body temperature (i.e., 37° C.), and these substances are classified as pharmaceuticals and need to be kept in a locked cabinet. The contrast materials are controlled like other pharmaceuticals, and so it is desired to limit access to these materials as well, and to create an audit trail of which persons have access to them. Accordingly, there is a need for a locked warming cabinet that creates an audit trail and which can be monitored for temperature. Controlling access to the contrast materials also limits incidents of contamination or suspected contamination of other pharmaceutical materials. Other controlled materials could be stored at elevated temperatures above or below 37° C., as need be.
For transport of pharmaceuticals, or for use of pharmaceuticals in a mobile situation, there is a need for a refrigerator or storage cabinet lock that operates under battery power so that the pharmaceuticals can be monitored (e.g., for temperature and/or humidity) during transport. Then, if the temperature or humidity was outside the acceptable range during shipping, it will be possible to deny access to the cabinet and to the possibly tainted medication, except for specially authorized supervisory personnel.
It is also desired to track the temperature of the refrigerator or other temperature-controlled cabinet, and automatically provide an alert warning if the temperature (or relative humidity) is outside an acceptable range.
A further need is for ensuring patient safety, i.e., to ensure drugs that have not been kept at the proper storage conditions, e.g., outside of an acceptable temperature range, are not administered to patients until their purity has been checked out by pharmacy staff.
The pharmaceutical industry has achieved a global reach an impact, with medicines and vaccines being shipped to all areas of the world. Many of these medicines and vaccines are temperature sensitive and have precise storage requirements. Unfortunately, during shipment the products can be subjected to extreme temperature and humidity changes, unforeseen delays during transit, especially international transit, and need for field delivery to remote points of use, which often requires several mode changes. In addition, the pharmaceutical companies are subject to relentless cost pressures, so there is a need to make shipping and distribution as efficient as possible while ensuring that the products that are delivered are of consistent quality.
At the present time, most refrigerated medications are shipped in twelve-inch by twenty-four-inch insulated boxes, with ice. These can include a digital thermometer device that logs the temperature, but does not lock the box closed, and does not guarantee that any medication in the box that was subject to poor temperature control is isolated and not distributed to a patient. Some medications are shipped in a box or crate without ice, and are shipped in a refrigerated container. These boxes may have a special security tape that is intended to reveal tampering, but these are not locked containers, and there is no means included to prevent distribution of the medications if they had been subjected to adverse temperature (or humidity) conditions.
A similar problem exists for selectively locking and unlocking a food storage refrigerator and/or warming cabinet at specific meal times in a weight loss or weight control problems.